Draft 1 for essay
(Somewhat effective but could use improvement)In life fire represents so many different physiological elements as well as multiple physical things. Its an element that has both positive and negative traits : traits that have been vital for human survival throughout time. Physically, fire can destroy, destabilize and provides an essential resource for humans. Physiologically fire can provide protection, hope, and direction. (thesis) In Jean Rhys’s novel Wide Sargasso Sea fire is the symbol used to represent the motif of trauma. This motif of trauma connects to Rhys’ theme that unless people who suffer trauma eventually learn to cope with it, it will build psychologically and will eventually be released harmfully.
The novel Wide Sargasso Sea commences with tension between the recently emancipated slaves in Jamaica and a wealthy family of mixed race landlords. This family is Antoinette’s family- they are perceived as not belonging to the community, and are despised by the native Jamaicans “I never looked at any strange negro. They hated us. They called us white cockroaches”(8). Antoinette acknowledges this ha
rotection in walls: “When I was safely home I sat close to the old wall at the end of the garden“ (8). However the physical walls only provide protection until they are burned down by the former slaves. Antoinette creates imaginary walls of protection. These walls contained her emotions, as she was full of fear. Antoinette needed them for protection against the past traumatic experiences but “....there would be nothing left but blackened walls and the mounting stone. That was always left. That could not be stolen or burned” (27). Without the physical wall, Antoinette has to face the emotion...
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..., it builds a wall, a wall that once again protects Antoinette against other people who ill treated her, and lets her be destroyed by beautiful flames.
Throughout his novel Wide Sargasso Sea, Rhys has used the element of fire to help the readers understand its significance as a psychological and physical support for Antoinette, against trauma. Subconsciously Antoinette was not able to cope with her past traumatic experiences, such as being targeted by Jamaicans, rejected by her mother and later by her husband. Rhys’ theme that unless people who suffer trauma eventually learn to cope with it, it will build psychologically and will eventually be released harmfully is expressed at the end of the novel by Antoinette burning down Rochester's house and eventually dying in the process.
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One obstacle Jeannette overcomes is unstable home life. The Wall’s family moves frequently because some family members were worried someone might be after them for money. When the family started “Doing the skedaddle.” (17)-their dad referred as a movement of fleeing very slowly and sneaky. According to this philosophy, the family experienced moving outside of their home in search for prosperity. The parents made it seem like an adventure instead of escaping their problems. For example, they would talk about gold and the prospector design to give a sense of hope. However, in terms of stopping at a place to live, it was always run down. Unfortunately, conditions worsened in terms of not having beds for the Walls’ children but improvised with boxes. Another example includes the house at 93 Little Hobart Street, Welch, West Virginia. Some problems that arose in the house were rotten pieces of wood, no toilet system but instead improvised with a bucket in the kitchen, no running water, and minimal electricity when they make the payments. A hole was dug for the glass castle foundation but garbage piled inside as a backup plan because trash collection fees exhorted their income. Today, society is determined to escape lower conditio...
...d to share their deepest and most private moments with their audience members, and this in turn will create a genuine, quality story. When asked if Jeannette Walls has fulfilled the duty given to her by William Faulkner, one should not even come close to hesitating with their response. In The Glass Castle, Walls shares some of the most personal and emotion-evoking moments of her life, and they clearly include the essential characteristics of writing as defined by Faulkner. With the expert use of Walls rhetorical strategy, she makes the reader see, hear, feel, and sense the emotion as if it is occurring firsthand. So, to conclude, Jeannette Walls has most definitely fulfilled Faulkner’s expectations of a writer by crafting a memoir stuffed with superb rhetorical strategies that thoroughly translates the events in Walls’ life to the readers in a very detailed manner.
In Jeannette Wall’s book The Glass Castle, the narrator and author Jeanette has had various terrifying encounters with chaos and destruction. She was burned cooking hot dogs when she was young, frozen in the winter, and starved when her family was low on money. Each time, she has pulled through and survived. In The Glass Castle, fire is a symbol representing chaos, destruction and fear. Jeanette has fought many battles involving neglect, starvation, and poverty but she has always pulled through these destructive experiences just like when she was a child burned from the hot dogs.
...astounding about Jeannette Walls is not just that she had the courage and acumen to escape her lifestyle, but that she describes her parents with such affection and kindness. By having such a dysfunctional family and childhood, Jeannette was thrown into a situation where she could either sink or swim, and she chose to swim. She rose above the hand that was dealt to her, and that in itself is truly inspiring. Reading this novel instilled me with a sense of extreme gratitude for what a healthy family really is. Her story reminded me to be appreciative and thankful for my family and my upbringing. The Glass Castle is a true story of victory against all odds, and at the same time a touching, emotional novel of genuine love in a family that, despite its extensive flaws, gave her the determination and perseverance that was required to achieve a successful life on her own.
Through retelling her stories, many times Jeannette she closes by pointing out how unique her father makes her feel. This is not by what he does, but it is by what he does not do. He allows her to become weak in the moment and then she has to find a way to overcome the weakness at hand. It cannot be denied Rex Walls did some awful things that harmed his children, mostly Jeannette. In the harm that she was put in he built a relationship like no other with her that made her feel so special.
Jeanette Walls is the picture-perfect illustration of an individual who finds righteousness for herself. She is the protagonist in the book “The Glass Castle”, who has an unfair miserable childhood due to how her parents were. Walls stands out for her determination as she goes out to the real world to seek her own justice, with the ultimate goal of being stable for once, and take responsibility for herself, not for the whole family.
The air is cool and crisp. Roosters can be heard welcoming the sun to a new day and a woman is seen, wearing a clean colorful wrap about her body and head, her shadow casting a lone silhouette on the stone wall. The woman leans over to slide a piece of paper into one of the cracks, hoping her prayer will be heard in this city of Jerusalem. Millions are inserting their prayers into the walls of Japanese temples, while an inmate in one of a hundred prisons across the United States looks past his wall toward the prayers he did not keep. Billions fall asleep each night surrounded by four walls and thousands travel to China to witness the grandest one of all. Who builds walls and who tears them down?
Fire. Neglect. Sexual Molestation. No one child should have to face what Jeannette Walls had to endure as a young child. However, Walls clearly shows this chaos and the dysfunctional issues that she had to overcome while she was growing up. Within her memoir, The Glass Castle, Walls incorporates little things that were important in her life in order to help the reader understand her story even more. These little things amount to important symbolisms and metaphors that help to give the story a deeper meaning and to truly understand Jeannette and her family’s life.
In the novel, The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls recounts her childhood as a tale of harsh struggle and of conflicting viewpoints. The set of ideals which she developed as an individual along with those instilled within her by her parents seemingly rival those purported by society and the developed world, creating an internal struggle greater than any of her physical conflicts. Examples of such conflicts involve the abstract areas of race, wealth versus poverty, and idealism versus realism.
The sense of fear attributed to the setting in 'Wide Sargasso Sea' may have been influenced by Rhys' own experiences as a creole woman growing up in the Caribbean. Rhys' great-grandfather's house was burned down by members of the local black community in an act of revenge, as he was a slave-owner. This event is often considered to have inspired Rhys to write about the arson of Coulibri. This supports the idea that Rhys was influenced by her own feelings of fear in her own home, which indicates that fear is a vital part of the setting in the
...ndurance of poverty, as we witness how Walls has turned her life around and told her inspiring story with the use of pathos, imagery, and narrative coherence to inspire others around her (that if she can do it, so can others). Jeannette made a huge impact to her life once she took matters into her own hands and left her parents to find out what life has in store for her and to prove to herself that she is a better individual and that anything is possible. Despite the harsh words and wrongful actions of Walls’ appalling parents who engage her through arduous experiences, she remained optimistic and made it through the most roughest and traumatic obstacles of her life at the age of three. Walls had always kept her head held high and survived the hardships God put upon her to get to where she is today; an author with a best selling novel to tell her bittersweet story.
"To Build a Fire Characters." Study Guides & Essay Editing. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Feb. 2014. .
... and an indication of Antoinette's fate. The most destructive fire in Wide Sargasso Sea comes at the end of the novella, when Antoinette burns Thornfield Hall down to the ground. While this action serves as an escape and an act of defiance, it is also destructive, as Bertha takes her own life in the process of taking power from her husband: "Then I turned around and saw the sky. It was red and all my life was in it... I saw the orchids and the stephanotis and the jasmine and the tree of life in flames" (170). Antoinette's ultimate act of rebellion will, of course, lead to her ultimate destruction--- the life that she sees in the burning sky will be extinguished when she comes crashing to the ground. Rhys' use of fire in moments that show or foreshadow physical and emotional devastation reflects the role of fire as a symbol of destruction in Wide Sargasso Sea.
...r left the house in the first place, that someone must have disappointed her on the way to church. The grandmother also points out that Mina went to the bathroom twice that morning, and that she notices that once she turns off the light at night, Mina turns on her flashlight, to write letters. Mina is once again feeling her space is invaded, and she swears at her grandmother, but because Mina never swears her grandmother knows it is coming from a place of guilt. The last sentence, which is a quote from the grandmother in which she says, “ I'm crazy...you haven't thought of sending me to the madhouse so long as I don't start throwing stones.” The ciche of not throwing stones in glass houses comes to mind, meaning that Mina’s grandmother is staying in her “place” as long as she is not revealing the injustice and sacrilege that is going on in the house, or in the world.
used by the Spanish Fascist’s to house prisoners. “The Wall” is told from a first